make me a pizza originally uploaded by neon.mamacita
Mrs. Marcos clued me into the fact that local pizza place, Punch, was included in the March 2010 issue of Rachael Ray’s magazine, Every Day with Rachael Ray. Basically they did a “March Madness” style bracket for pizza and took favorites from all over the country and broke them down into East Coast, West Coast, Southwest, and Midwest and then pitted them against each other in a pizza showdown for the record books.
While it was definitely a very cool idea, in theory, I’m not quite sure it’s fair to pit individual pizzas against each other in order to find a national winner. While it certainly fits the time of the year well, it would have been much better for them to run the contest much like how we did the Lazy Lightning South Metro Pizza Taste Test–you know, scientifically ;-)
Anyway, while I recognized some of the heavy hitters on the East Coast, I was not familiar with any in the Midwest aside from Punch. I enjoy Punch pizza quite a bit, don’t get me wrong, but I’m quite certain I would not consider it my favorite pizza in Minnesota. So I can’t say that I was all that surprised that Punch did not advance past the second round.
So be sure to check out the bracket, thanks to Slice’s writeup on the piece, and then discuss what Minnesota pizza(s) you would have preferred to see entered in the Rachael Ray competition and why.
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February 24th, 2010 at 8:10 am
[...] According to Lazy Lightning, our very own Punch Pizza, was included in the March 2010 issue of Rachael Ray’s magazine, Every Day with Rachael Ray. [...]
February 24th, 2010 at 8:15 am
Margherita with onions, garlic, sun-dried tomatoes, D.O.C. style UNCUT baby!
February 24th, 2010 at 8:31 am
I would like to see Casa Nostra Pizzeria & Ristorante Italiano of Lakeville included, though only if it were accompanied by interviews of the owners’ friends and relatives.
Why? See this thread for reference.
February 24th, 2010 at 8:43 am
Bill, given Punch is a chain I wouldn’t figure that you would go there.
February 24th, 2010 at 8:46 am
JP, they give away free pizza–a lot. Living with a budget nazi changes the rules a bit ;-)
February 24th, 2010 at 9:00 am
You can’t go wrong with free pizza.
February 24th, 2010 at 9:05 am
Almost, but not quite, as good as free beer.
February 24th, 2010 at 9:18 am
That’s so funny! My friends and I are also conducting a year long pizza tasting… well, mostly because we don’t have time to run to a new pizza place every day/week so we’re going to attempt to accomplish this at a one per month rate.
We have only been to one, but I thought it was pretty good. We went to Black Sheep (http://www.blacksheeppizza.com/) in Minneapolis. They have coal fired pizza (a favorite of mine).
I’m not sure where we are going next, but we are following the best of list on Metromix TC. Punch is on the list so I’ll have to keep this in mind when we try them.
February 24th, 2010 at 11:03 am
What a stupid “contest”/article. Those pizzas are all over the map (and I’m not talking about geography). Why not have them compete against tacos and cheeseburgers too?
To save you a bunch of traveling, in our “region” Punch and Zaffiro’s and Malnati’s and Maria’s are nothing at all like one another. And none are like DiFara’s or Grimaldi’s or Pizzeria Bianco.
Why not group them into “VPN/neapolitan style”, “thin crust”, “specialty” and “traditional” and at least have some objective point of reference/context?
Lame.
February 24th, 2010 at 11:53 am
It was for a magazine with a national audience that was shooting for a theme. What do you expect? I followed the links and all I can say is I can not imagine a single thing that could taste good enough for me to ever wait 3 hours to eat it, let alone travel to another state. Somehow I get the feeling that Ed Levine + Adam Kuban have a completely different perspective on life than I do. Heck, when I was a minor, I used to wonder WTF we were doing standing in a 1 hour line to eat at Perkins, or Old Country Buffet.
February 24th, 2010 at 12:05 pm
Oh come on, all you can eat ice cream, wilted salad, carved dry meats, and bread pudding. Mmm.
February 24th, 2010 at 3:19 pm
Duffs Pizza on Main Street in the tiny town of Vermillion is very very good. South of the river too.
February 24th, 2010 at 9:03 pm
Red Savoy makes a mean pizza, I have only had it from their Saint Paul location so I’m not sure if it’s equally as good at the south metro locations.
February 25th, 2010 at 7:42 am
I prefer Italian style thin crust wood fired pizza , so Punch is my favorite in town. Pizza Nea in Mpls also is very good. I also like Black Sheep , but the style is different.. so I like it in a different way. I also liked the service style and ambience at Black Sheep and the beer selection, on the other hand living in Burnsville is not conducive to eating at Black Sheep very often and they arent open for lunch…
Red Savoy is a very good version of what i call Upper Midwest pizza. Thin crust, crisscross cut, lots of cheese and a garlicky sausage that kicks the taste buds. Many other locations across Minnesota, Wisconsin and Upper Michigan do this version well. It tends to come off best in a third place bar atmosphere.
I am not a fan of deep dish Chicago style. My wife’s family, Irish and from Chicago and lots of them (Catholic old school) are big Lou Malnati devotees. We have a reunion at their family home in July every year where one night is Malnati night with many pizzas ordered to feed over 60 people. I guess if you like tasteless baking powder doughy bread, tomato sauce with no herbs or salt then maybe this is the way to go. I always thought it had something to do with the blandness favored in American Irish cooking.
they do steaks and hot dogs very well in Chicago, and the mexican food there is very good from the top (Rick Bayless places, or the Adobo Grill) to the bottom (mom and pop taco joints ).
if you like woodfired pizza, also check out Brick’s in Hudson Wisconsin.
February 25th, 2010 at 9:37 am
Black Sheep just started serving lunch.
Yes!
Even Chicago deep dish are divided into at least two groups — with and without cornmeal dough. I much prefer the former at places like Gino’s East or even the small chain Giordano’s (extra crust layer on top style).